Final answer:
A 5-year-old child exhibiting speech production issues with consonant sounds should initially be suspected of having high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss, which can be confirmed with proper auditory testing. Hearing aids can potentially treat this type of hearing loss. Noise-induced damage at 4000-5000 Hz can be a common cause for these symptoms in children.
Step-by-step explanation:
When conducting a speech-language assessment on a 5-year-old child with speech production issues such as multiple distortions, omissions, and substitutions, particularly with consonant sounds, one should initially suspect some degree of hearing loss. The symptoms described could be indicative of high-frequency sensorineural hearing loss, which is often associated with difficulty hearing and producing certain speech sounds, especially consonants. Hearing aids are known to be effective in treating various types of hearing loss, including sensorineural hearing loss, which can stem from exposure to loud noises, aging, head or acoustic trauma, infections, medications, tumors, and toxins.
Hearing loss at 4000 Hz, as mentioned in the reference material, may suggest a history of noise-induced hearing loss, common in individuals exposed to loud sounds, such as a cap gun in the case of a child. The severity of hearing loss can be measured through different tests, including bone conduction tests that can distinguish between nerve damage and middle ear damage. In this instance, when a child has a hearing loss of 60 dB near 5000 Hz but normal hearing elsewhere, this implies that a tone at 5000 Hz has to be significantly more intense to be barely audible when compared to a 400 Hz tone for that child.